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Facebook Tracks the Status Updates and Messages You Don't Write Too
Jah-Wren Ryel writes "It turns out Facebook tracks the stuff that people type and then erase before hitting the post button. If you start writing a message, and then think better of it and decide not to post it, Facebook still adds it to the dossier they keep on you. From the article: 'Storing text as you type isn't uncommon on other websites. For example, if you use Gmail, your draft messages are automatically saved as you type them. Even if you close the browser without saving, you can usually find a (nearly) complete copy of the email you were typing in your Drafts folder. Facebook is using essentially the same technology here. The difference is that Google is saving your messages to help you. Facebook users don't expect their unposted thoughts to be collected, nor do they benefit from it.'"
Facebook has an option to download all your data. Do these texts turn up in these downloads as well? If not Facebook violates EU law.
I can see myself following a policy of "never type directly into a web browser, only copy and paste" in the near future. (And here's yet another reason to avoid "cloud" services and prefer local storage for anything personal.)
"The difference is that Google is saving your messages to help you."
Well, we hope at least. When Google's robot army kicks down my door for looking up subversive material, will we still be saying this?
..."Stasibook" and be done with it?
Must kill Zuckerberg, Must kill Zuckerberg, Must kill ^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H
Must post cat video.
"The difference is that Google is saving your messages to help you."
Well, we hope at least. When Google's robot army kicks down my door for looking up subversive material, will we still be saying this?
Obviously drafts do help you ... but I wouldn't mind betting they also analyse the data and use it to predict your preferences in exactly the same way that Facebook does!
FTFA: "In their article, Das and Kramer claim to only send back information to Facebook that indicates whether you self-censored, not what you typed. The Facebook rep I spoke with agreed that the company isn’t collecting the text of self-censored posts."
Capturing a person's though process has a lot of value, sometimes more than the actual post written. Think of brand recognition, for a simple example. I like Pep... oops, I mean, Coke.
And that is quite harmless. Its if writing a draft "dear mum and dad I'd like to telly you I'm gay. I know its against your religious beliefs", then deleting it will result in adverts for gay support groups, or anything else that could give someone an idea of what might not have been said that there is a problem.
Time to create firefox/chrome add-on that types and then deletes all kinds of bullshit...
Facebook has become difficult to even type in the status box, because they're trying so hard to fill in suggestions and the like that the cursor jumps around. Half the time it jumbles up characters, likely because there's a crap-ton on javascript running with every keystroke.
So everybody should periodically type "Mark Zuckerberg is a douchebag" and delete it. ;-)
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Social Media was so 2013.
Get with it, its all about meeting up with people in real-time. Awesome. You make a call, talk to a person and arrange to meet up somewhere. Say for dinner or a drink. Maybe even a hook-up.
I don't save anything as drafts. I send them ALL!
...
Even the stupid ones!
Then when you sit down the NSA, they are in a poor bargaining position and say "Look, you are talking to a guy who sends stupid emails. Does my behavior suggest I have anything to hide?"
/NSA agent starts sweating
Priest: "Universe from nothing, no laws of physics, sped up time"+ huge discrepancies. Creationism? No. Big Bang Theory
If you're going to go to the effort of typing something as insightful as "Mark Zuckerberg is a douchebag" I say go ahead and post it. What's he going to do, de-friend you?
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Facebook and other social media highly deceptive and manipulative personal information brokers who have no moral code other purpose other than their own bottom elicit, compile, memorialize and sell excruciatingly detailed and ruinous personal information dossiers to the highest bidder including but not limited to all your future employers !
Ha ha. Gotcha, sucker.
I'm with you. The benefits of the evolution of communications into personal digital communications across the globe has been stolen by corporate interests and the government and used to create a mindfuck situation of unbelievable proportions. It seems like not long ago the US federal government was arguing about how new digital telephone switches so impacted their traditional ability to intercept calls that they need special legislative provisions that required interception capabilities to be built into all telephony switches or else they would lose their ability to investigate crime. Now we all wonder if we have any privacy at all, even in our own homes (how do you know your cell phone hasn't been programmed to perform electronic eavesdropping of your every conversation?), never mind in our on-line e-mails, and now possibly even in our thoughts about blog postings. Its enough to make one paranoid!